Pullets’ first night out!

[Ajp23]

Tonight is the big night! We added our four, 9 week old pullets to the coop with the big girls. They’ve had two weeks of see but no touch and yesterday we gave them a supervised meeting in the run. All went well.

We put them back in their separate coop last night but first thing this morning, they went to the run with our ten hens. They seemed to really enjoy themselves, shared food and water with no big issues. We let the bigs go to roost then added the babies to the roost. Everything seemed fine but I’m still nervous.

Any advice such as should I be out there in the morning when they’ve woken up but the automatic door isn’t open yet? Leave them alone to figure it out?

Here’s a picture of today’s chicken run visitor for your trouble

 

[rosemarythyme]

If you feel the run is safe enough, you can prop open the auto door slightly (if it's the type that can be propped open) so the pullets can run out at any time if needed. I usually just put a brick under the door and I do it for about 5 nights to give them a bit of adjustment time.

Otherwise I assume your auto door is set to open at sunrise? That should work just fine, even if they're awake they really don't tend to move around much if there's not enough light to navigate by.